The Doctor and Clara
land on a damaged Russian Submarine in 1983 as it spirals out of
control into the ocean depths.

An alien creature is loose on board, having escaped from a block
of Arctic ice. With tempers flaring and a cargo of nuclear
weapons on board, it’s not just the crew but the whole of
humanity at stake!

It is the North Pole, in the year 1983. Aboard a Russian
submarine, a warning repeats that the "signal is genuine." The
Captain and first mate use their keys to prime an ICBM launch.
They prepare to fire, but are interrupted by the entrance of the
Professor, singing. The Captain reports the drill has been
abandoned. The first mate says they must run it again, to which
the Captain says, "Tomorrow." The Captain then asks the
Professor about the "specimen," wondering if it's a mammoth. In
the hold, the crewman in charge of the specimen muses that they
are supposed to wait till the crew arrives back in Moscow to
thaw the specimen out. However, he uses a blowtorch to thaw the
block of ice, until he is grabbed by a claw that emerges from
the ice.

Havoc erupts on the submarine, the hull has been breached and
crew members are being attacked by a green armoured figure. The
TARDIS materialises as the Captain orders the sub to be brought
to the surface, The Doctor and Clara are thrown across the
bridge and Clara concludes that they are not in Las Vegas, as
they expected to be. The Captain asks who they are, while being
informed by a crew member that the main turbines aren't
responding. The Doctor tells them their only chance to survive
is to use the lateral thrusters in order to land on a ridge
which will preventing it from dropping further, which the
captain then orders the crew to do.

Crew members search the Doctor and Clara, confiscating a number
of items from his pockets, including a doll, a ball of yarn and
his Sonic Screwdriver, and the TARDIS dematerialises. Clara
falls into a puddle after a jolt rocks the sub, temporarily
losing consciousness, and wakes up to the Doctor and the Captain
arguing. They are interrupted by a raspy noise coming from
behind the Doctor, who initially thinks that it's gas, but turns
around to find the green armoured figure, which he recognises as
an Ice Warrior, who identifies himself as Grand Marshal Skaldak.
The professor reveals that Skaldak has likely been sleeping
under the ice for five thousand years. Just as the Doctor seems
to be close to diffusing the tense situation, Lieutenant
Stepashin sneaks up behind Skaldak and electrocutes him with a
cattle prod. The Doctor berates the Lieutenant and reveals that
it was an extremely bad idea to have done so, and warns the crew
to lock up Skaldak.

They chain Skaldak up, and he asks one of the crew if he has
been asleep for 5,000 years. The crewman confirms it. Meanwhile,
the Doctor tells the Captain and Clara that Skaldak is so feared
that his enemies would carve his name into their flesh. The
Captain wants to know more, and the Doctor says that there isn't
time, before telling him more.

Skaldak signals for his brothers to save him. Back with the
Captain, the Professor, the First Mate, and the Doctor, Clara
says that she wouldn't make a very good spy as she doesn't speak
Russian. The Doctor tries to shush her. Stepashin believes that
Skaldak is a Western plot.

Working
Title(s):■
N/A

Things to look out for:■ An element
to The Ice Warrior that has never been seen before in the
series.■ First time
the doctor used the HADS setting on the Tardis since The Krotons.■ This is the
second time an Ice Warrior has been frozen in ice, the first was
in their first appearance the Ice Warriors.■ This is the
first story with the Ice Warriors as the antagonist, in which
their weakness to heat wasn't knowingly utilised.■ This is the
first televised story to feature the Ice Warriors since The Monster of Peladon
(1974).